JOY FOR THE JOURNEY #10, IDENTICAL TWINS

There are twins everywhere these days. Have you seen them? Not babies anymore, these twins are all grown up. And they’re so easy to recognize…it’s written all over their faces like an ice cream cone on a 7-year old boy’s face in July. You can see it in their eyes and you can hear it in the tone of their voices. And they all have one thing in common – they’re wound as tight as a spool of Mother’s sewing thread.

I can tell you their names, too. They even sound alike. And in every set of two, the names are identical. Two peas in a pod. Wanna meet them? Just walk on any street. Stand on any corner. Shop in any store. Wait in any checkout line. Or even wait for a car backing out of a parking space that you want. I promise you – you’re gonna meet some twins. They might make some hand gestures you haven’t seen before. Or even mutter some words you won’t hear in Sunday School.

Pull up the digital note screen on your smart phone. Or if you’re old school, get a pen and pad and write down these names. On second thought, no need to record them. You’ll meet them so many times, you won’t be able to erase their names from your hard drive. Are you ready? Please let me introduce you to Hurry and Worry.

I see that grin. You’ve met them already. You just didn’t know their names. But you know them by their actions. Hurry just can’t stand the thought that you might be in front of him. So he’ll test the volume of his car’s horn if you make him wait while you let somebody in line. Now he’s going to be 10 seconds late. You should have known.

And Worry, his identical partner, is pulling her hair out by the roots, afraid that the last great bargain will disappear from the shelf before she weaves and ducks and runs her cart over small children to get it. “Who knows,” as one such twin was heard to say, “I know they’re open 24 hours, but if they run out, they might close early.”

Hurry could be a nice guy. If he could only convince Worry to take a chill pill. Take those shepherds, for example. After Hurry convinced Worry that they didn’t have to be afraid of the bright Light that lit up the field one night where they were keeping watch over their flock, they got their camels in high gear and took off lickety-split in the right direction. And they went with haste, Luke 2:16. No waiting till they had a day off from watching the sheep… no lolly-gagging around…no loafing…no goofing off.

And they found Mary and Joseph and the “Good News of a Great Joy.”

And guess what? No need to worry. There’s enough to go around for everybody … an endless supply for all people (Luke 2:10).